Identifying triggers and learning to manage them
Triggers are typically a response to a trauma experience and are not the same as becoming annoyed or stunned (for example) at a minor inconvenience.
What are Triggers?
Triggers are anything that can bring back mental health problems. Triggers can be anything, which makes it hard to avoid or manage. Triggers are also unique to the individual, so just because someone is not triggered by a stimuli, does not mean a stimuli is not triggering. Common triggers include:
People
Songs
Environments
Items
Scents
Activities
Thoughts
What happens when I'm triggered?
When we get triggered, our automatic nervous system (ANS) becomes activated. This can alert our fight, flight, freeze, or fawn response.
Triggers can cause sadness, panic, anger, despondence, dissociation, anxiety, spiraling, or can otherwise cause us to become dysregulated.
Triggers are typically a response to a trauma experience and are not the same as becoming annoyed or stunned (for example) at a minor inconvenience. Triggers can be abrupt and really scary for those experiencing them.
Identifying triggers
Identifying triggers is the first step in knowing how to deal with them. This can be hard as sometimes we don't know something is a trigger until we're triggered by it! Take a moment to reflect on specific times you were triggered. Make sure to do this in a neutral and controlled setting (like during therapy or while journaling). Then, ask yourself:
What triggered me?
What was it about that situation, event, or stimuli that was so triggering?
What was going on in my body?
What emotions came up for me?
Avoiding triggers
A common way todeal with triggers is to avoid them. This makes sense logically because if a trigger is out of sight, it is also out of mind. This can be very helpful in some cases but not always. This is because there are some triggers that we are not able to always avoid. For example, scents can be triggering, and while we can make sure that we never use a fragrance, we cannot control whether others may use that specific fragrance or scent.
Additionally, when we avoid triggers, our body continuously registers that stimuli as dangerous. This in turn, "gives power" to the stimuli making it more likely that the impact of becoming triggered continuously gets stronger over time. This can lead to harmful coping behaviors, such as never wanting to leave the house out of fear of becoming triggered. Or, using substances every time a trigger occurs.
Managing triggers
Managing triggers is the most effective way with dealing with them, because the truth is, we may not be able to completely eliminate our triggers. When we learn how to manage our triggers, we can remind our bodies that the stimuli is not a an actual threat and that we are not in imminent danger. Common ways to manage triggers include:
Desensitization
Distress Tolerance
Grounding
Self-soothing
Managing triggers: desensitizing
Desensitizing is the process of repeatedly exposing oneself to a triggering stimuli to minimize the reaction that the stimuli causes. This type of therapy is often referred to as Exposure Therapy or Flooding. This process is gradual and has been shown to be effective in treating specific types of triggers, like phobias. It is not recommended that any one does it on their own without the support of a trained professional.
Managing Triggers: Distress Tolerance
Distress tolerance is a treatment approach where the goal is to focus on symptom management.
Urge surfing is an effective way to treat triggers when there is an unhelpful behavior associated with the trigger (like smoking).
The goal is to understand that triggers will reach their peak at around 30 minutes (or less). So, if we can manage the trigger through distractions or self-soothing, for example, we disassociate the unhelpful behavior from the trigger.
Managing triggers: grounding and self-soothing
Grounding and self-soothing are ways to relaxing and calm our bodies after being triggered. These are ways we can remind ourselves that we are safe. Grounding and self-soothing offer a variety of benefits such as better sleep, reduced stress, normalized heart rate, regulated breathing, reduced pain, and many more. Helpful grounding and self-soothing activities are:
5-4-3-2-1 method
Rainbow Room
Yoga and meditation
Warm baths and showers
Calming music